Why the Age Of MMO's has ended:

Ive been seeing this a lot on the forums lately, nostalgia craving and people thinking one day we'll go back to the good old old and gold well I'm afraid those days have passed and it is time to move onto the future or be lost in times memory.

What Happened?

People forget that there is a reason that the age of MMO's has passed and that reason is that WoW, made it die. It was not an intentional death but it was a tragic reality of success consequences, you do better at something, someone is going to compete with you. The simple truth is, every time WoW got better, someone else wanted a chunk, and piece by piece the MMO Pie has been split into thousands of micro-mmo's trying to copy WoW's recipe with limited if little to no actual result.

The thing is... WoW is a great MMO, it was so great, that these things became an obvious marketing campaign, in many ways we owe WoW a lot including and not limited to:
- Making the PC a globally known console to consider cool to use.
- Publishing PC gaming as a marketing brand.
- Adding significant development interest in PC gaming and more namely online gaming.

There's a list a mile long but those are some of its many accomplishments. It gave publishers an idea to take advantage of and ever since that idea has sadly, turned sour.

It is the inevitability of reality my friends, people like money, money comes from people, and they will use the easiest incentive possible to grab that money. An online role playing game with the ability to meet new individuals that also play the same game and do things together with them, for a fixed cash price, or a micro-transaction fee, its a genius scam that sadly suckers a lot of narrow sighted people into it.

As a result, money becomes the priority and at the cost of quality, quality drops because quantity makes more cash.

This, is where the MMO decline began.

The Age Of Competition:

Some of these names may be familiar to you:
- Vanguard, Saga of Heroes.
- Lord Of The Rings Online.
- Warhammer Online.
- Starwars, The Old Republic.
- RIFT.
- Dungeons and Dragons Online.

Probably the most known, excluding Everquest and older titles, but the relevance is clear, what do they all have in common?

Every last one of these MMO's used WoW as its base to create a design on its own game play, concept and development, adding their own little niches as time went on to add flavor to a very old pie.

You see, it became clear that WoW's success was going to be a task few could ever reach, come on, 12.5 million subs? That's an impressive market, everyone wants that pie, and they're going to make games like WoW to get a piece.

Using a brand name was a good choice for some (SWTOR/WAR/LOTRO/DDO) because using an already interesting brand meant people were attracted to the brand more than the game, even if the game turned out to be bad.

For Others (Vanguard/RIFT) they were trying to invent new foundations on old ideas. Unfortunately, those ideas didn't take off far and ultimately using old mechanics proved something, we, as players don't actually "like" nostalgia.

You see, players don't actually like having to do something twice unless there's an incentive to do it. Players have zero motivation to repeat the same content because in a game where the same content is uninteresting, or simply productive instead of immersion, there is no real joy in the experience so much as the relief its over.

WoW was flawed from the Start:

People often think of Vanillia as the golden age but it wasn't always the case. Vanillia had its own list of problems and most actually will remember them, from laggy servers, habits of waiting in a que to enter the game to the fact that only the elite were really able to enter the end game content, which effectively left many downtrodden and depressed that they were penalized for not being able to enjoy the experience.

Most of us, came from a background, that background was stereotypically escapism, because most of us had been bullied in school or had underlying issues, you, me, were the 90's generation, its our generation that's changed here, we cant go back because we've moved on.

Were not a teenager anymore, were not leaving high school or joining collage for the first time, we are now in our 20's, some of us even late 30's, and 40's. I remember playing Vanillia and knowing people that played in their 40's who must now be at least 52 or older.

Doesn't that say something to people?

Our golden era of glory wasn't really golden so much as quantified. We remember it because of its flaws, not because of its greatness, we remember what we wanted to see improve, raging at the forums for hours about class imbalances and difficulty settings. We wanted easier content, or harder content, we wanted stuff now, or stuff later.

Remember when you had to grind Hydraxian Waterlords? Just like you do now with Emperor Shaohao? Is it actually THAT different?

No, not really.

Its not the game that's changed, its you, the player that has changed. You expect more yet you demand less, you want harder content yet you want it to be easier to access, you want a challenge yet you don't want to grind for it.

So Cataclysm came and revamped our old world, made some more engaging quest lines for leveling but at the cost of the freedom to explore and the enjoyment of going where you pleased to do that content.

Now while it isn't strictly true, you can still go where you please, yet... it doesn't feel the same, it feels, changed, forced, streamlined.

...Then you remember, wasn't it really like that all the time anyway?

I mean, you still HAD to reach level 60 to DO end game content, people often forget that irony.

In fact, id argue that the older quests were not only harder, but downright unforgiving, sometimes your ability to progress was downright impossible, because unless you were prepared to farm mobs for HOURs just to get levels (and believe me I remember that well) you needed a group to kill elites that were literally un-soloable.

It was "not" fun.

To be honest, it hasn't changed that much, I was 16 when I started and now I'm 24, that's 8 years of playing this game and I think back and remember how much I hated grinding then and how much I hate it now.

The point I'm trying to make is, I'm not the only one, you, are the same person, you, were the kid once, now your the adult, your trying to justify the old days being good, but looking back...

...Can you honestly say they were?

Community Death:

We feel like MOP has killed the community but no, in reality, WE killed the community. It happened in Wrath Of the Lich King LONG before now when we were made by Blizzard to be so hyped up about competition that we became competitive, we fought each other, we hurt each other, now we regret making those choices but its too late to go back.

Cataclysm came and we weren't ready for it, we thought we could compete but we had nothing to compete for because Cata's end game started brutal and ended laughably easy.

We stopped caring, that's what happened, we just, gave up.

Because we had been made to, we had been raised to.

Every time we were given a false expectation that the next content would be either hard, long, as memorable as Sunwell Isle, or as brutally arbitrary as the ahn'quiraj preprep event.

Those, things... had some extremely memorable community building events, you know why I loved Sunwell Isle? Because EVERYONE took part in it, the nobody, the somebody, the everyone knows you body.

It was a community building experience that allowed us to unify for a common cause, the goal of it was to drive Kael's evil forces away and retake the Sun Well.

And it was fun.

However...

WOTLK Didn't HAVE that, because not only did every WOTLK quest line pretty much require you to be part of a single movement but it stopped being interesting when anyone could do it. We stopped caring that someone was special because nobody was, we stopped being special from the moment we were able to stop being special.

Yet.... that's not a bad thing, special is a cruel word, it means entitlement, royalties "I am important" nonsense that makes bad players. Its good to see the community die because the humbling element of that is that as time goes on, you realize, it doesn't matter.

Do you honestly care?

The game is good, isn't it, yes? I enjoy it, I might not see as many people playing it but I don't care, I enjoy it as it is, flaws and pros.

Granted, id like things to change or be added, but the more you add to something the less special it is.

TL-snoreeeee-:

What I'm trying to say is... its not the game that changed, its you, you've been brainwashed to have high expectations because the stuff you did before was expected to be quality of a pristine level.

Yet now you cant be content, you'll never be content, because that quality is never coming back again, the first time you did it will never be the second time you do it.

Going back to that wont make you better, it will remind you even more so of how much you missed that time.

Let it go, move on, let the era of MMO's pass into something else, and what you will want "will" come again because it will be something new, something different.

And sooner or later, it will bring things back together.

Just have a little faith

And a little acceptance of what you've lost which does not mean you cant be happy that you've had it.

Don't cry because its over...

...smile, because it happened.

And we, people, for better or worse, were there to see the storm to the end.

Look, I don't know what you have been smoking for the past 6 years.. but when WoW first came out it was blatantly copying and improving everything good from other MMOs while leaving out alot of bad, and it still does that to this day. If anything WoW probably has the least innovation and original ideas out of all other big MMOs, and most copying (stealing).

You tried so hard to make this some kind of Journalism-worthy report with a message and knowledge of the issue, but just failed on whatever message you were trying to get off. Age of MMO's over? Please.

What happened was they removed any emotional hook from the game and replaced it with monotonous expectation.

Remember when you used to feel excited? Or scared? Or frustrated? Remember the thrill of getting the drop, killing that rare, downing that boss, getting that unique ability? Blizzard has a nice, neat, "sensible" approach to WoW now, but the game no longer generates any emotional response that generates loyalty and true fans. In their quest to make things simple, accessible, streamlined, and all the all Blizzard buzzwords, all the really did was rip the heart out of the game and replace it with empty repetition.

OP's post is a classic case of "To analyze and make generalized and sweeping statements pretending to hold profound truth, I take myself as the single anecdotal evidence, and simply presume everyone else and everything else is identical to me".

To pick a few random examples of this:

"[WoW made] the PC a globally known console to consider cool to use."

I remember pretty clearly that PC gaming existed and was rather mainstream long before WoW. It sounds like FOR YOU, this may have been your first use of PC for gaming. For many others however, it was the other way around.

"Most of us, came from a background, that background was stereotypically escapism, because most of us had been bullied in school or had underlying issues"

OK, gosh... Yeah, I am sure this is general enough to apply to the immensely varied set of WoW players. Just looking at my own guild, there are players of all age, both sexes, all professions, all backgrounds. I am also pretty sure not all or even the majority were bullied in school or have more "underlying issues" than the average population, although granted the average population in any given country has "underlying issues", regardless if they play MMO or not.

Gee, I am not sure if I should laugh or cry at the absurd pretense of your post based on... yourself?

Most of us, came from a background, that background was stereotypically escapism, because most of us had been bullied in school or had underlying issues, you, me, were the 90's generation, its our generation that's changed here, we cant go back because we've moved on.

This is by far the most untrue assumption I've ever read. Back in 2004 when WoW was released I was doing my A Level in school and nearly every one in my class played WoW. Do you really think they all were bullied or needed a real life escape?

Yes, the general audience have changed, new players today are different from new players then, it's a different generation with different expectations and above all totally different experience when it comes to PC games. But even the younger generation now playing WoW as a "new" game is not full of young nerds getting bullied all day and whishing for some virtual place to call home instead of their miserable real life.

Well, of course some(!) of them are like that, but mostly they are "normal" people playing a great PC game.

And sorry, but your whole "We are no more special"-argument is also false. There are still these special players, raiders in the top progress guilds, heck, even members of normal so called "semi-hardcore" guilds are very special compared to the mass of non raiding players. Even I have several players I like to call fanbois and I'm really not that special But yes, they "stalk" me, check out my armory every day, ask my questions about my char, etc. There is still something like "fame" in WoW.

Look at the community site, how much is written about guilds like method or blood legion or Paragon? I did not understand this whole fandom ever, but okay, most players I know, know so much about these guilds and their members (besides Affinity I really do not know anyone from BL and him just due to the fact he plays Mistweaver like me).

Really, your whole post is just collection of wrong assumptions. The reality is, the MMO-Age is not over. Yes, the numbers for WoW are declining (mostly due to the "Cataclysm"), but it's still a big market.

So you are saying (on your gigantic post ) you loved some aspects of the older games, and all we can do now is just try to move on and remember those times with nostalgia. You condradict yourself a lot man, sometimes you blame the company for the changes and other times is entirely the gamer's fault.

Originally Posted by CaptainV

Those, things... had some extremely memorable community building events

This is all i can tell you man...This aspect is the only reason why i cant JUST move on and keep playing the game...i mean i played Wow because it was a place full of smart design choices where people had to interact, do quests or attack eachother.
All i had to do to live an adventure was simply follow the road the developers made for you (design choices and community based events)...and the road now is just empty. You know what i mean? I just feel lonely playing the game as it is today.

But hey, the new Island on patch 5.4 sounds like fun and community based, really made me want to play it ;p
Maybe some more stuff like this will come on the future

Most of us, came from a background, that background was stereotypically escapism, because most of us had been bullied in school or had underlying issues, you, me, were the 90's generation, its our generation that's changed here, we cant go back because we've moved on.

"We feel like MOP has killed the community but no, in reality, WE killed the community. It happened in Wrath Of the Lich King LONG before now when we were made by Blizzard to be so hyped up about competition that we became competitive, we fought each other, we hurt each other, now we regret making those choices but its too late to go back."

I don't recall Blizzard making us do anything in this game except paying to be able to log in.

i love it how people talk about WoW subs dropping down not know even why.

they got a big spike of subs when they entered asian market and its the asian market that is not very intersted at wow atm. europe and NA numbers change very slow. when that stabilizes you will get the normal real number of people intersted in WoW

I think one of the biggest things that killed the classic EQ-style MMORPG is the fact the internet has become so pervasive in gaming.

If you'd mentioned the idea that in 2013 you'd have access to thousands of games to digitally download and play at your leisure (Steam) to a 2004 WoW dev, they'd probably never believe you.

I mean people throw a hissy fit about games like SimCity or Diablo 3 having always-online components to them, but if you didn't have to see the server select screen most of us would just play the game without even realizing it had internet connectivity.

Almost every game these days has some online component to it, even Nintendo's embraced it. Modern MMORPGs are trying as hard as possible to no longer seem like an evolution on Everquest, but instead to feel like a single-player RPG with online components.

And that's where WoW is inevitably going to die, not because players hate it. But because new players would rather play Final Fantasy XL with online components you don't even notice instead of playing a game like WoW where the online is in your face all the time.

MMOs are mutating, as devs continue to iterate and innovate old concepts, and an entire multi-generational vertical-and-horizontal social complex of gamers evolves and grows up in a gaming world almost entirely saturated with online interaction from the beginning.

If anything, persistent, social, interactable worlds are becoming the gold standard for a lot of genres or game designs. It's less that "MMOs are dead" and more that MMOs have melted and seeped into the fiber of every genre.

Maybe it's more that the need to label stuff "MMO!!!!" is dying off because, well, yeah... duh it's online and full of other people. Why wouldn't it be?

If you're referring specifically to the "grind-and-gear" model of MMORPGs, then, yes, those are on the outs because it's a — if you'll pardon my frankness — stupid waste of time, and earning stuff in the real world is more fun than grinding up a meter in a fake one you won't even be playing in 6 months. Especially if you're paying for the privilege of doing it.